NSA director: Cyber attacks need international nor...

NSA director: Cyber attacks need international norms

by Dorothy Atkins, July 27, 2014

Richard Ledgett speaks at The Aspen Security Forum

Nations around the world need to come together and establish international standards that regulate cyber attacks, said Richard Ledgett, deputy director for the National Security Agency at The Aspen Security Forum on Saturday.

There currently aren’t international norms governing cyber warfare, which could include attacks on public infrastructure like power plants. That is a dangerous situation, Ledgett said.

“It’s a very, very rich cyber threat environment,” he said.

During Saturday’s session at the Aspen Meadows campus titled “Security Challenges in the Ever-Evolving Cyber Realm,” Ledgett answered questions on the state of the NSA and the future of cyber threats from The New York Times reporter David E. Sanger.

China poses the greatest threat to the United States, in part because the Chinese government discloses intelligence collected by the government to commercial enterprises. The NSA doesn’t do that, Ledgett noted.